FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT INTERNET COMPANIES - PAGE 5

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Online scrapbook Pinterest has raised a new $200 million round of funding that gives it a valuation of $2.5 billion, the company said on Wednesday. Pinterest, which allows users to create online bulletin boards based on various themes such as travel, decorating, or sports, said in a statement it would use the new capital to build new features, beef up its infrastructure, and make "strategic acquisitions of both talent and technology. " Long-short hedge fund Valiant led the investment round, joined by existing investors Andreessen Horowitz, Bessemer Venture Partners and FirstMark Capital.

David M. Simons is frustrated for the very reasons "investors" in Internet stocks are dancing a jig. "Having put money in Internet stocks any time since April is not investing," groused Simons, managing director of Digital Video Investments in New York. "Which is not to say it's wrong," he continued, but it's "trading," not investing. Simons consistently makes trenchant commentary on the true values of Internet companies like America Online Inc. and Yahoo Inc. Those two companies' stocks are up 135 percent and 114 percent, respectively, since the beginning of the year.

The urge to merge is setting new records on-line: A study released last week by a San Francisco consulting firm showed that Web merger and acquisition activity grew 22-fold from the first half of 1998 to the first half of 1999. Led by huge deals such as the $6.7 billion buyout of Excite by Redwood City, Calif., neighbor @Home Corp., the first half of the year saw 169 Web-based transactions worth a total of $33.4 billion. In the first six months of 1998, there were 56 deals totaling $1.5 billion.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Yahoo Inc bolstered its line-up of online video programming on Monday with two original comedy series and a new Web channel that will stream live concerts. The two comedy series, which Yahoo will show on its website next year, are the first long-form original comedies in Yahoo's growing selection of online video. Each series will consist of eight 30-minute episodes which Yahoo will post on its website all at once. The new programs underscore the struggling Web portal's efforts to bolster its traffic and its advertising revenue by streaming more video programs on its website.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - China's top search engine Baidu Inc has hired Google Inc's former artificial intelligence (AI) chief Andrew Ng to spearhead research in a field that promises to show Internet companies how to maximize use of their vast data trove. Baidu said Friday it has opened a new AI lab in Silicon Valley to complement its Deep Learning Lab and Big Data Lab in Beijing, both of which will also be headed by Ng. The news was announced at Baidu's newly opened research complex in Sunnyvale, California, located near the Mountain View headquarters of Google, where Ng had founded and led an elite Deep Learning team in 2011.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Corporate-backed venture groups invested $2.1 billion in the quarter ended June 30, up 16 percent from the same period in 2011, underscoring the continued allure start-ups hold for their more established competitors. The corporate-backed funds invested in some 118 companies in the United States, according to a report released on Thursday by consultancy CB Insights, with internet companies winning almost one-third of the cash. Healthcare and the automotive/transportation sectors each took 20 percent.

(Reuters) - Shares of LinkedIn Corp climbed nearly 21 percent in midday trading on Friday on results that beat analysts' estimates for the seventh quarter in a row. The social networking website for professionals reported on Thursday an 81 percent increase in fourth-quarter revenue and raised its forecast for the current first quarter. Several research firms raised their price targets for the company. "If execution continues, we struggle to see how margin expansion can't approach (and possibly exceed)

Shares of LinkedIn Corp. climbed 21 percent Friday on results that beat analysts' estimates for the seventh quarter in a row. The social networking website for professionals on Thursday reported an 81 percent increase in fourth-quarter revenue and raised its forecast for the current first quarter. Several research firms raised their price targets for the company. "If execution continues, we struggle to see how margin expansion can't approach (and possibly exceed) 2012 levels," wrote Macquarie analyst Tom White in a note to investors.

BRASILIA/SAO PAULO (Reuters) - A government plan to shield Brazil from alleged U.S. spying by forcing global Internet companies to store data on Brazilian users inside the country has run into mounting opposition in Congress, politicians said on Monday. The legislation was proposed by President Dilma Rousseff following revelations that the U.S. National Security Agency conducted surveillance on her emails and phone calls, along with those of average Brazilian citizens. Brazil's largest political party, which is a Rousseff ally, is not supporting the requirement, which has Internet companies up in arms.

The White House wants a "Do Not Track" option put on websites to give consumers greater control of their personal information online, but Internet companies and privacy groups are at odds on how tight the controls should be. The stalemate could lead to a legislative crackdown on Internet privacy. That has firms such as Google Inc. and Facebook Inc. that rely heavily on collecting user data worried that any legislation could lead to cuts in online advertising that would eat into their profits.